Stalins Organ

However I try it doesn't spell "rapture"

not sure that's altogether relevant tho - B-17's & B-24's couldn't carry the big RAF bombs could they? So ramping up production for the USAAF would have been pointless. I know B-29's could - apparently they could carry _2_ extrnally 1 under each wing root - for experimetnal purposes at least!! :eek: I recall reading somewhere they poured the explosves into the big bombs and it took a week or 10 days to cool the Tallboys down - can anyone confirm that??

You've fallen for a pith-take old son They weer called pith helments, but the British ones were at least often, if not mostly, made with cork - as the wiki says, pith was replaced because cork is more durable.

Yeah I though of 617 sqn daylight bombing oave r the weekend too.... this note from the wiki article may explain it tho' - "this" is why it became a joint venture between hhte RN & USAAF: Basically the RAF thought the heavy bombs sufficient, and the USAAF needed something in a hurry.

Looks like a corker to me!:cool:

Yeah - some of the German constructions in France were quite impressive I suspect the US go the job of dropping them because it required precision daylight bombing which was supposed to be their forte.

Today's wiki front page features a "did you know" about a WW2 V-2 launching bunker in Nth France. In the "Subsequent investigations and utilisation" section there is a link to something called a "Disney Bomb" - which turns out to be a rocket propelled bomb designed by the RN, inspired by a Disney film (hence the name) and only ever dropped by the USAAF. the RN's interest in such a weapon (none of its a/c could carry it) was in attacking U-boat pens. One was dropped on the afore-mentioned bunker as a test in 1945, and retrieved some time recently

The mothball fleet is fascinating even from this distance - last year I looked up hte old NS Savannah - the civilian nuclear powered freighter - through Google Earth - I remember reading a NatGeo article about it some tiem in the 60's about how it was he way forward, etc & wondered what had happened to it - found its location & a nice overhead shot. Anyway - cute though the blog is, the ships are obviously NOT all supposed to be ready to re-enter service at a moment's notice - the "best" are on 20-120 days notice, and many of them are set to be scrapped with no intention of maintaining them to any standard at all.

I spent 2 weeks based in Harrisburg Pa 30 years ago - and took as many day trips to Gettysburg as I could - "locals" will be better able to tell you if it is near your proposed route, but if you have any nterest in military history. If this is likely a "once in a lifetime" then you'll eternally regret either not going there......or having to leave after not enough time spent wandering the battlefield! I also managed a short stop at the public displays at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds - assuming they are stil there, and still ahve the awesome displays of vehicles (ie they haven't rusted away!) it's also worth the time

thanks for the memories!!

Yes the question of what constitutes surrender is IMO an important one. Surrender invariably involves cessation of hostilities by all forces, overseas colonies & other resources such as shipping coming "under the fold" of the occupation, restoratoin of some level of civil government for the citizens, etc. This is more or less what happened in Romania when it surrendered in 1918, and to Luxembourg in 1914 - "the war is over for you" But in Serbia and Belgium it didn't - the civilian population was placed under very harsh military govt, they were "asset stripped", forced labour was imposed, etc. - but the war wasn't over for them - they fought on - as also with Poland in WW2. France in WW2 falls between the 2 - but IMO WW2 is not the same - WW1 was fought with almost Napoleonic idiplomatic rules - in WW2 most of those got chucked out the window by all sides!

A common mistake in WW1 games - Serbia got completely over-run in "the real war", and not only didn't surrender, but after a year of retraining & reorganising supplied 2 corps on the Macedonian front for the rest of the war! simlarly belgium and Romania - both of which were essentially almsot completely over-run except for small slivers of land, but were re-armed and retrained, kept several corps in the field, and in Romania's case arguably had a much more effective army after "conquest" than before!! Romania only "surrendered" with the fall of Tsarist russia - and rejoined the war on 10 november - the day before the armistice!!

Hey you wanna be a Federal Republic with anything not specifically allotted to the Central Govt as reserved for the states...or whatever it is... Now see if you'd stuck with a monarchy....

I got no problem with that - but given the choice (admittedly limited & artificial but for the sake of discussion....) between paying for the care of addicts, etc., from general taxation with the drugs illegal, or paying from general taxation and with the drugs legal and taxed, or compulsory private insurance with appropraite rates if you are using, or any other method that gives some measure of "cost recovery - IMO the latter means less drain on non-users - whether taxpayers or insurance purchasers.

In these parts I believe the taxes on tobacco earn more than the known health costs from its use (adn are now increased for revenue and deterrance rather than cost recovery), ditto for alcohol, and (not quite in the same vein) petrol taxes pay for more than roading costs. there is a small black market in tobacco for sure - but it is "policed" by customs & excise rather than by the police per se. I see no reason why taxes on other drugs can't be set to a simlar "cost recovery" level.

Mt Hubbard's military record make for some pretty sorry reading - "lacking in essential qualities of judgment, leadership and cooperation" "found "unsatisfactory for any assignment"" http://www.lermanet.com/L_Ron_Hubbard/ and check here for false claims - http://www.pownetwork.org/phonies/phonies1204.htm (search for his name - it's about 1/2 way down)

I like this - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-13598607 But what nearly made me lose my sushi (seriously - I am having sushi for lunch!!) was this bit - Ferkin' brilliant!! :D:D

rofl...well that might explain why he needs 20 deg elevation to get the shot to travel any distance at all....

Not to mention the shell is 2 lb, not 4 as per the commentary....

More likely they either did it themselves to save embarrassment part 2...or the US just decided to go in while the Paki's are still in some disarray?? FWIW there's a thread about it on that wonderful conspiracy site "Above Top Secret" - http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread707555/pg1 Caution: there's some seriously loony people posting on there.....

Not like it's really new - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Ambrose - the section on controversy notes at least some of the above

Be a big black ignorant American! (not saying that all Americans are anything in particular, but that one does appear to fit the bill)

Unsuccessful strategies for losing weight, and how to improve reading and comrephension skills so as to recognise the quiet car? And here

Like Ranger - didn't quite manage to injure anyone, but firearm safety screwup - Way back when I was a part time soldier we had a rangeshoot for our platoon - only a few guys turned up & we had something like 5000 rds of 5.56mm & 2000 of 7.62. Well we spent all day blasting off on full auto on M-16's & FN-MAG's at 50, 100, 200 metres vs paper & falling plate. Had to clean the rifles a few times - only used up about 2500 rounds of the 5.56 & 1000 of 7.62 (we only had 2 guns to use for that). so at the end of the day we unloaded all the weapons, checked clear & threw them in the back of the truck to go back to barracks & clean them there. so standing around the top of a 44 gal drum with a couple of other guys I strip my M-16 and there's a live round sitting on the end of the bolt!!:eek: Just slightly cocked to one side where the ejector pin had pushed it but not enough to spit it out due to carbon around the ejector "hook". Cost me a dozen beers, but I still reckon the Sgt who checked clear shold have gone halves!!:cool:

And interesting article in today's papers about US drug companies lobbying to de-fang Pharmac here - http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/5005467/Pharmac-under-fire-ahead-of-US-free-trade-talks